2018/2019

2018/2019

DM270

M-FIL/06 (HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY)

DEPARTMENT OF HUMANITIES

PHILOSOPHY

PERCORSO COMUNE

1°

2nd semester (25/02/2019 - 05/06/2019)

6

36 lesson hours

Italian

ORAL TEST

FRANCIONI GIOVANNI (titolare) - 6 ECTS

This course is intended for MA students who have gained no fewer than 6 ETCS in History of Early Modern Philosophy. To fulfill such requirements is necessary in order to sit the exam.

This course is an introduction to the most important themes and the most influential tendences of thought in the Enlightenment, through the study of a selection of texts and of specific secondary literature.

Montesquieu, the “English model” and the governments’ typology. Montesquieu's Esprit des Lois (1748) draws the first picture of the rising "science of society". It is a seminal text for liberalism and constitutionalism, which will become the paradygm for political theories from the Enlightenment to the French Revolution. It has been read under different lights: a moderate reading, focusing on the "English model", is counterbalanced by those who recover the very specific research about classical republics in order to draw reform and utopian programs.
This course aims at a critical reading of the main concepts in the work, starting from the classification of political forms set on the opposition despotism vs. freedom which Montesquieu opposes to the universalistic models proposed by the tradition of juridical contractualism, in order to investigate the complexity of the actual state of European nations in the 18th Century.

Lectures

* Montesquieu, Lo spirito delle leggi, Italian translation, R. Derathé (ed.), preface by G. Macchia, Milan, Rizzoli, 1989 (Classici della BUR), 2 vols.
Following chapters have to be read (please note: the reading of Montesqiueu text needs to be supported by the reading of Derathe's commentary, at the end of each volume): Preface by G. Macchia, p. 5-18; Introduction by R. Derathé, p. 41-63 (§§ I-V); "Avvertimento dell'Autore"; "Prefazione dell'Autore"; Book I, II, III, V, VI, VIII, XI, XII, XIV, XVII, XVIII, XIX, XXIX.
* L. Landi, L’Inghilterra e il pensiero politico di Montesquieu, Padua, CEDAM, 1981, pp. 23-88, 143-243, 244-332, 347-466, 514-632 (the pdf is available – please ask the teacher).
* G. Francioni, Gli illuministi e lo Stato. I modelli politici fra utopia e riforma, Como-Pavia, Ibis, 2012.

Those students who can not take part to the lectures will be asked to study, in addition to this list:
* D. Felice, Introduzione a Montesquieu, Bologna, Clueb, 2013, pp. 9-163 (the pdf is available: http://www.montesquieu.it/biblioteca/Testi/Introduzione_montesquieu.pdf)

Oral

Oral